sour times

The trial and tribulations of racing across the pond on the J/125 West Coast Warrior…

So the last two days have been eventful. After hitting something a few days ago we lost about 40% of our boat speed and driving was next to impossible. It got worse. Yesterday we were checking the rudder out again and found the bearing was being pushed up and eventually to the point where water was seeping through and about 2″ of bearing was showing. Sketchy shit 600 miles from land. Sails down and time to work. We put the emergency rudder in and took off the quadrant. Webb managed to bang the bearing back down and get it all hooked up. Only about an hour’s worth of work. Still some binding but… we are able to break free! Turn from J-120 to J-125… fun.

Last night we saw 24kts of wind and were ripping along under the 4A. I was able to hold it on the step for extended amounts of time, this is the boat I love. I head off watch and bam! The dam tack line fails! Someone undersized the nice strop holding the ferrals that were put on in place of blocks… Wonder what rigging company did that? Anyone who wants to knowcan email or PM me… or ask at the bar. Don’t worry only another 15 minute delay. Funny thing is we are still averaging faster than FunnelWeb through all this. That goofy thing looks like it needs 100kts of wind to get going!

We hope it is all going to hold together and we can at least catch Relentless and Horizon and have fun getting to some drinks! Title inspiration thanks to Portishead. Track the Transpac fleet here.